In Atreaum, Queen Marguerite's hands trembled over the scrying basin.
The water refused to take form. Again.
Nothing was working, and her frustration grew with each attempt. Surrounding her were twelve court magicians, all more terrified than the one before them. But they were hired to help the Queen, and they would—or be killed for defying her.
Marguerite's bony finger drew the circles with crushed pearl while one magician burned rue and bone incense. Eleven spoke Lucian's full name—first, middle, and last—under the pale moonlight.
The water remained dark and murky—stubbornly so. Her rite of recall failed, and the world itself knew it.
"Why won't he come back?" she whispered.
She snapped her fingers. The Spymaster stepped from the shadow behind the curtain with a grin that knew too much.
"Because he doesn't need to anymore," he said lightly.
She turned to him sharply.
"I made him. Sent him on assignments he could safely complete. I gave him purpose."
"And he made himself afterward. There's a difference."
She narrowed her eyes.
"He is not Alaric's replacement."
"No," the Spymaster agreed. "He's worse. Or better. Depending on which side of the grave you sit on."
She bit her lip.
"If I could have one thing back," she whispered. "Just one—I would summon Alaric's spirit. Let him speak once more."
The Spymaster didn't laugh.
He only bowed.
"The shrine you built remains undisturbed. No echo. No reply. If Alaric is at rest, he is resting well beyond reach."
She scowled at him. None of the morticians returned to the mausoleum, but they at least said hello after she built their effigies. Alaric, her closest advisor, was the only exception.
"Then I will need my mortician back—whatever it takes."
The Spymaster grinned as he blinked both eyes, one at a time. He looked like a deranged lizard.
"Then you will be disappointed, my Queen."
+
Far from the court, the Marionette watched the sky ripple between yarnball clouds. Her lair—deep beneath a forgotten root-vault—had once been soft enough for waiting.
But the longer she waited, the more restless she became.
"If my daughter won't visit me," she said, threading a bone comb through her ink-black hair, "I will have to bring her back myself."
Her fingers trailed over a mask. The one Alice had worn before Lucian named her.
"Children never appreciate being raised by hands instead of hearts," she said.
And she smiled, beautiful and cold.
"But I always finish my patterns."
As she rose from her resting place, five dolls wearing masks followed, obedient and silent.
"Let's go find your sibling."
+
Prince Alexander was still hiding in the mausoleum annex, though it had begun to rot from disuse. Gethra provided bread and ink, but he refused all contact from Staesis.
Mayor Gray had summoned for him thrice.
Alexander ignored every missive.
"He will never understand why I said no to the pact," the Prince murmured. "But the orchard does. Gethra,"
The librarian looked up from her research. "Yes, my Prince?"
"I'm going to visit Samuel."
She adjusted her glasses and nodded. "Doesn't he go by another name now?"
Alexander laughed. "Sandeater or Sam, what does it matter? He's still my friend."
+
Like most things, Lucian found the orchard by accident. He'd gotten directions from a salt farmer. "My daughter usually brings back sandfruit for the village, but she's still recovering from a fever."
Lucian looked at him questioningly. "Didn't your daughter recently return?"
The man nodded, stroking his beard. "Aren't you one of those fancy death doctors? Sometimes it takes more effort to come back than to stay dead."
Death doctor. That's new. "Kind of. I haven't encountered someone who got sick during their return."
The salt farmer smiled. "Goes to show life ain't all dark. Sometimes even the dead will surprise you."
+
He left the village with some water and sandapples, and he and Alice had been walking ever since.
A few women had been thoughtful enough to pack him and Alice some sunhats, and he was grateful—the sun crawled high in the sky.
It felt like summer, but there weren't any trees to hide behind.
I understand why the crops failed now. They walked until Lucian saw a sandbar, and he held out his hand for the water flask.
+
The sand shifted under his feet in patterns — not dunes, not dust, but cultivated shapes. Like bark turned to crystal.
The orchard rose on no roots, and was created entirely from sand and wood. In neat rows, trees shaped like sand bore fruit, with some as colorful as glass.
He saw peaches formed from ash-grit. Citrus with glowing rinds. Even blackberries wept golden sap.
Lucian stared in awe.
"You're early," said a voice.
A man stepped out of the orchard, barefoot and sun-dark, robes made of dyed sackcloth and silk. He carried a staff made of hardened sand glass and wore earrings shaped like crescent moons.
The Grimoire trembled.
[THREAD ANOMALY DETECTED]
Alias: Sandeater
Status: Living
Threadtype: Rootbinding + Ritualforge Hybrid
Connection: Prince Alexander (Classified)
Lucian raised a brow.
"You're the one who gave the villagers their... edible sand?"
"I gave them what the land offered," the Sandeater replied. "I only translated it."
Lucian approached a little slower. "You know Prince Alexander?"
"He saved the sapling," the man said. "Before it had leaves. Before it had me."
Lucian tilted his head. "I don't understand."
The Sandeater knelt and pulled back some of the loose dirt. Beneath, a twisted root made of clay spiraled upward like a spiral horn.
"It was my first garden. And the first rebellion. He gave it water, and the town tried to salt it out. But I grew."
Lucian crouched down beside him.
"You're not a spirit."
"No."
"You're not a citizen."
"I was, once. But I asked the land to make me something it needed more."
Lucian exhaled.
"What do you make now?"
The Sandeater smiled.
"Weapons. Seeds. Memory. All three are the same, if you use them well."
+
Later that evening, Lucian wandered alone through the edge of the orchard. The night was more bearable, especially when the Sandeater gave them fresh water from his underground well.
Each fruit shimmered with half-memories. In the right light, the sand was hardened with heat and formed edible glass delicacies.
Carefully, his gloved fingertip touched a fig. In its reflection, he saw a girl brushing salt from her boots.
He touched a pear, and heard Alexander laugh—not like royalty, but like a boy hiding under a fountain during a storm.
He picked none of them.
"Let memory grow," he whispered. "Don't take it before it ripens."
+
He returned to the village near sundown.
The salt-washed wind carried whispers, but none meant harm.
Alice was waiting for him, sewing something — a simple red thread pattern on a handkerchief.
"You saw him?"
"Yes."
"And?"
"He's not human anymore. Not fully."
"You're not, either," she said, smiling gently. "But you're still you."
Lucian looked down at the cloth in her lap.
"What are you making?"
"A patch for the Prince."
"For what?"
"He gave life to the orchard. He should remember how to care for things."
Lucian sat beside her.
"Even things the crown discarded."
+
High above, in a palace wrapped in forgotten prayer, the Queen stood before Alaric's shrine.
Dust covered the glass.
Her voice cracked.
"If you won't come back, at least tell me what he's becoming."
But the shrine answered only in silence.
The same silence that answered every prayer she no longer knew how to cast.
What use is faith if everyone I relied on doesn't answer me?